Paleontologists digging near the coast of Peru have uncovered the largest fossilized skull of a sperm whale ever found. The 12-million-year-old skull, which measures nearly 10 feet across, belonged to a now-extinct genus and species of sperm whale that may have been as long as 57 feet. The fossil includes the longest documented sperm whale teeth, measuring more than 14 fearsome inches. The whale, described in a paper published Thursday in the journal Nature, was christened Leviathan melvillei in honor of "Moby Dick" author Herman Melville.

Memo to: NHL players. From: A lifelong hockey fan. Subject: Hits to the head. Please, stop. Stop and think about the potential consequences the next time you're tempted to use your elbow to drive the head of an unsuspecting opponent into the glass. Stop and think what you're doing before you shove a vulnerable opponent into the boards, causing a collision the human body wasn't designed to withstand. Don't stop being physical. No one wants that.

Scientists have made a rare find: four skulls of a new species of giant plant-eating dinosaur, one of them completely intact. Skulls of plant-eating dinosaurs were so light and fragile that they have rarely been preserved to be discovered by paleontologists. Reaction to the find, made in Dinosaur National Monument in eastern Utah, was "probably not printable in a newspaper," said Dan Chure, a paleontologist with the monument. "Everyone was really dumbfounded," Chure said.

Jerry Snapp loved Tiffany, and it broke his heart that he had to sell her. Close to 200 pounds, almost 4 feet tall, a foot and a half wide, she was his most beautiful skull. He picked her up in the spring of '97. He heard about her from a friend and wanted to know where she came from. "The L.A. Zoo," his friend said. And how much did she cost? "$500." The next day he rented a truck and headed off to D&D Rendering in Vernon. Tiffany was out back, her head slowly rotting in a gray plastic box, destined for a landfill if a buyer wasn't found.

Los Angeles County sheriff's detectives hope three jewel-encrusted rings and a gold necklace found near the skulls of a man and woman in the Angeles National Forest after the Station fire will help identify the deceased and reveal more about how they died. The skulls were found Dec. 24 and Dec. 26 in the burned-out area below Angeles Forest Highway, near mile marker 19. "It appears that there was some trauma to at least one of the skulls," Det. John Duncan said. The trauma to the male skull could be a bullet hole, investigators said.

One of the skulls was marked by a large circular hole in the forehead, which authorities suspect was a bullet wound. The other, found roughly 25 to 50 yards away in a remote section of the Angeles National Forest, showed signs of severe trauma. On Monday, a forensic anthropologist and other investigators examined the skulls and other human bones found in the area last week. The bones are like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle that authorities hope will lead them to the identities of the victims and eventually to who or what killed them.

A human skull with a bullet hole in it has been found in the Angeles National Forest. Two hikers came across it Thursday evening on a hillside that had been burned in the Station fire. Homicide detectives are overseeing the investigation but don't yet know how long the skull was there, said Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department spokesman Steve Whitmore. "It appears to be burned," Whitmore said. The Station fire, which started Aug. 26, burned 250 square miles of forest.

The skull of an ice age giant ground sloth was recently uncovered at a construction site in Riverside County and could be headed for display at the San Bernardino County Museum. The bones dating back 1.8 million years were discovered Nov. 18 on the site of a future Southern California Edison substation as earthmovers flattened the land in a hilly area west of Beaumont, said Rick Greenwood, director of Edison's environment health and safety division. Work in the area was immediately halted.

Remains of four more people were unearthed from the backyard of a Cleveland home, raising to 10 the number of bodies found in and near Anthony Sowell's house. Sowell, 50, a registered sex offender, has been charged with five counts of aggravated murder. Police Chief Michael McGrath said the four bodies were buried in the backyard and a skull was found in a bucket in the basement. Authorities do not know whether the skull belongs to an 11th victim, said Lt. Thomas Stacho, a police spokesman.